Larkin Debate (was: Hello genius forum)

Discussion of the nature of Ultimate Reality and the path to Enlightenment.
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Matt Gregory
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Larkin Debate (was: Hello genius forum)

Post by Matt Gregory »

Here I am again. I'm looking for philosophical stimulation. I want to get back into thinking again, but it's hard. I don't know anyone who's interested in philosophy. Also, I have a full-time job now, so it's very hard to find time to think. It's quite a huge disadvantage. It's like trying to run with no legs. Just one ankle. Maybe a couple toes. So I'm not here to be overwhelmed with text. I feel that happens to me everytime I come here.

I've been reading the Larkin Debate on David's site. It's pretty good stuff. That was a major highlight of the genius forum scene.
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ardy
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Re: Hello genius forum

Post by ardy »

Matt: Nice to see you here. Thinking is better done via introspection and as you are busy, observation is very handy too. Keep your eyes and ears open and there will be a thousand things for you to think about.
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Diebert van Rhijn
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Re: Hello genius forum

Post by Diebert van Rhijn »

Hi Matt, welcome back. Proper (proportional) or reasonable thought takes energy. Also In my experience it's not as much time that's missing but more stuff like energy and "space", silence, focus and so on. As even with seas of time available, it doesn't necessarily will lead to any better thought. So I'd suggest looking for other causes, possibly emotional investments or energy depletion which can affect clarity. And all you need is clarity, not quantity!
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Cahoot
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Re: Hello genius forum

Post by Cahoot »

Matt Gregory wrote:So I'm not here to be overwhelmed with text. I feel that happens to me everytime I come here.
Hi Matt. I think that a simple Socratic dialogue would be productive for a discussion forum. Answering a question with a simple yes or no (if possible), and then requesting amplification if necessary for clearer understanding, would be a departure from the past.

I think it’s a way to examine concepts economically, and is flexible for when any particular interest prompts a change in premise or another view.
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Dan Rowden
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Re: Hello genius forum

Post by Dan Rowden »

Hey Matt,

Fuck off.

Stop pretending and using this forum as a means to pretend you're more than an everyday person. Just accept it. No harm done. This place doesn't offer anything intermediary and you know it. Join a monastery.
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Matt Gregory
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Re: Hello genius forum

Post by Matt Gregory »

Right on.
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Re: Hello genius forum

Post by Bobo »

Hey Matt, I can't say whether this debate was a major highlight of GF, I'm half through Chapter 1 and I have a few remarks so far:
David Quinn wrote:Anyway, I would like to discuss the nature of genius. To my mind, genius is a property which is intimately linked with consciousness. A genius is someone whose consciousness is of a very high quality. I'm not referring here to the ability to think complicatedly, but rather to its opposite: the ability to think truthfully and simply. A genius possesses the simplicity of someone who has opened his mind to the nature of Reality. He no longer experiences any delusion in his mind and thus no longer has to conjure up complex solutions to imaginary philosophical problems in the way that ordinary academics do. He is able to cut through to the very core of things with ease. This leads to another essential quality of genius, which is independence of thought. Because a genius grounds his every thought in Ultimate Reality, his thinking is completely unaffected by the values, myths, beliefs, and mores of his culture. He is like a child of God, producing every thought from within himself, dwelling far above the confines of human relativism. His every movement is an expression of eternity.
"This leads to another essential quality of genius, which is independence of thought." This (independence of thought) seems to be in line with the program of the Enlightenment, but David doesn't cite any thinker of the Enlightenment in his list of historical examples of genius. He doesn't cite any thinker of the Renaissance too, my current understanding of the term "genius" is that it belongs the best to the Renaissance, with Michelangelo as a representative not Da Vinci as Weininger and others put it.
David Quinn wrote:Aquinus used to do groundbreaking work in the field of theology. It used to impress his fellow theologians, and no doubt it required a considerable amount of intelligence to carry it out, but in the larger scheme of things, looked at from the perspective of a great philosopher, it is nothing.
David Quinn wrote:It won't be long before Feynman's theory of QED is old hat, just like Aquinas's quaint speculations.
I think that here David demonstrates not only an ignorance on how science works but theology too. While some scientific theories may fall in disuse the basis of scientific knowledge is to be improved and extended upon those scientific theories, you could even measure the success of a theory on its capacity to generate new theories and fields, that doesn't make the previous theory less important quite the contrary. And while to some extent that doesn't happen on a more general camp like theology as you cannot disprove a theological theory, you can have aristotelians or platonists to this day and that is not to say that the debate on metaphysics today isn't alive and thriving.
David Quinn wrote:Our deaths are no certainty. Science could, in the next decade or two, discover the key to physical immortality through their work in genetics. The possibility currently seems remote, but it can't be dismissed altogether. It's also possible that our consciousness (which is essentially what we call "life") will survive the death of our bodies in some way. Again, the possibility seems remote, but it still exists nonetheless.

Death is an empirical event that we presume will occur in the future; this alone makes it inherently uncertain.
Here for example David is effectively saying that the immortality of the soul is not out the table, so what to say about Aquinas theology?

http://members.optushome.com.au/davidqu ... npu01.html

Edit here - I guess David could be saying that both death and its contrary are uncertain, that's a logical possibility. Anyway he premissed the uncertainty of death on the possibility of the other and if the possibility of the other is also uncertain so is the uncertainty of death. Or better said our deaths are an uncertain uncertainty not just an uncertainty.

Edit 2 - To finish Chapter 1 there's this dialogue:
From David Quinn
Wed Dec 17, 2003 1:59 am:
M wrote:
DQ: A simple example is the Buddhist truth that "nothing inherently exists". This is ultimately true because a thing necessarily depends on other things for its existence....It doesn't inherently exist.
M: Existence isn't a predicate (of itself) and is presupposed in hypothesizing all possible worlds. In other words, in all possible worlds, all possible worlds exist, so existence is necessary in all possible worlds.
Contingent existence, yes.
DQ: The same principle applies to everything else in Nature; there can never be an instance in which the assertion "nothing inherently exist" is not true. It is part and parcel of the very nature of existence.
M: Let's assume that existence is a predicate (of that which enables existence and thus doesn't necessarily exist ). You're effectively declaring that contingent existence must be necessary to itself by nature. Or, it is the nature of existence to be necessarily contingent.
The latter, yes.
The obvious problem here is that a necessary predicate, or a predicate that always accompanies a concept, cannot be true only under certain conditions or it would not always accompany that concept. Contingency and necessity are polar opposites; think about it.
True, an assertion that is only true in certain cirumstances cannot be classed as a necessary truth (which is true in all circumstances). But this has no bearing on the point I was making - which is that whenever or wherever something exists, its existence is necessarily contingent. That is to say, a thing can never have a non-contingent form of existence under any circumstances.
We have no experience of anything that occurs outside spacetime, so how can we be sure that something timeless exists or, if so, what it means to be timeless?
Logical/definitional truths are timeless in the sense that they can never be falsified. For example, 1+1 will always equal 2, given the way we currently define these terms. It is not something that will become false over time.
What does "Ultimate Reality" mean???
Nature as it really is, as opposed to what deluded people falsely imagine it to be.
"A simple example is the Buddhist truth that "nothing inherently exists". This is ultimately true because a thing necessarily depends on other things for its existence"

So we have that nothing inherently exists because a thing necessarily depends on other things for its existence. But something that is necessary is something that has inherent existence.

1. Nothing inherently exists.
2. (1) inherently exists.

3. And we have a contradiction. Or David is affirming that something is and is not at the same time or both. (Nothing is an absolute term)
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Diebert van Rhijn
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Re: Hello genius forum

Post by Diebert van Rhijn »

Hi Bobo, it would be nice if David could react on this but I know these texts well enough to be able to give my reading of it in the mean time.
Bobo wrote: but David doesn't cite any thinker of the Enlightenment in his list of historical examples of genius. He doesn't cite any thinker of the Renaissance too
That's because his definition of genius has nothing to do with the so-called "age of reason". It's true that for example a "genius" thinker like Nietzsche favored ancient Greece and Italian Renaissances as "vigorous", affirming the body and the secular, promoting science and technology while producing strong individuals. This ties in with his idea of drawing up distinctions between sickness and health, between descending and ascending life. His reasoning underlines the affirmation of life energies and criticizes everything that suppresses and inhibits a fuller expression of primary instincts and deeper "holistic" intuitions. But one has to see this in the light of his brutal attacks on religion, morality, mass culture and the banality of late 19th century (proto-modern) European society, resulting in liberalism, feminism, anarchism, and socialist movements which he describes as expression of declining life, of sickness and ressentiment. But there are many who would define these as the very fruit of Enlightenment Humanism. What happened here?
my current understanding of the term "genius" is that it belongs the best to the Renaissance, with Michelangelo as a representative not Da Vinci as Weininger and others put it.
That's because you engage here in a thoroughly aesthetic and appearance based thinking which could be called, loosely, feminine.
I think that here David demonstrates not only an ignorance on how science works but theology too. While some scientific theories may fall in disuse the basis of scientific knowledge is to be improved and extended upon those scientific theories, you could even measure the success of a theory on its capacity to generate new theories and fields, that doesn't make the previous theory less important quite the contrary.
He's talking about Feynman's theory which is not the same as the "basis of scientific knowledge". Even Aquinas bases his many ideas on solid philosophical groundwork but that doesn't make it "important" in the way you are suggesting. It's a matter of being able to think in terms of millennia, not just decades or the odd century. It's reasonable to expect most current scientific ideas to turn into quaint and extremely limited when seen from radical different perspectives, not unlike any earlier theological theories. And yet they still might carry or develop sound philosophical and scientific notions!
And while to some extent that doesn't happen on a more general camp like theology as you cannot disprove a theological theory, you can have aristotelians or platonists to this day and that is not to say that the debate on metaphysics today isn't alive and thriving.
But that was not the idea at the time at all. Conclusive proofs were being formulated based on "unshakable" axioms which just turned out not to be.
Here for example David is effectively saying that the immortality of the soul is not out the table, so what to say about Aquinas theology?
That Aquinas' theology doesn't deal truthfully with its own inherent uncertainties, turning it quaint and overtaken for any current readership.
So we have that nothing inherently exists because a thing necessarily depends on other things for its existence. But something that is necessary is something that has inherent existence.
It depends not on any specific nature -- inherent, intrinsic, essential -- to become or remain what it is. The existence of causality denies any real self-nature because of its unlimited change and relativity. Perhaps you are interpreting the idea of necessity as something specific instead of logical?
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Re: Hello genius forum

Post by Bobo »

Diebert van Rhijn wrote:Hi Bobo, it would be nice if David could react on this but I know these texts well enough to be able to give my reading of it in the mean time.
Hey, Dieb. David can explain his views better than anyone, for sure, but there is a lot of that format of debate on this forum already, so I thought that by making some commentary, and commentary over commentary, it could work to generate some analysis. So any input is welcome.
That's because his definition of genius has nothing to do with the so-called "age of reason". It's true that for example a "genius" thinker like Nietzsche favored ancient Greece and Italian Renaissances as "vigorous", affirming the body and the secular, promoting science and technology while producing strong individuals. This ties in with his idea of drawing up distinctions between sickness and health, between descending and ascending life. His reasoning underlines the affirmation of life energies and criticizes everything that suppresses and inhibits a fuller expression of primary instincts and deeper "holistic" intuitions. But one has to see this in the light of his brutal attacks on religion, morality, mass culture and the banality of late 19th century (proto-modern) European society, resulting in liberalism, feminism, anarchism, and socialist movements which he describes as expression of declining life, of sickness and ressentiment. But there are many who would define these as the very fruit of Enlightenment Humanism. What happened here?
The enlightenment (and other artistic and scientific revolutions or reforms, like the renaissance too) had as its motor changes in the economy and power of the time and place where it happened, that means it was moved by business and money. Art and science are not economical activities per se (and neither artists or scientist are businessman themselves) but they can be captured by and exist in relation to other powers that form the cultural (timely) relations. Now a 'Reason', for example, that is presupposed timeless will either fall with the times or have to turn against the powers from where it sprung up. That can happen with universalistic values where it fails to come to fruition it may show signs of its own decay.
That's because you engage here in a thoroughly aesthetic and appearance based thinking which could be called, loosely, feminine.
That depends on what you mean. You could be saying something as stupid as women are beautiful, men are ugly, so aesthetics is a feminine thing. Do you think aesthetics or thought has a gender? Maybe you're antropomorphizing and then using it normatively.

He's talking about Feynman's theory which is not the same as the "basis of scientific knowledge". Even Aquinas bases his many ideas on solid philosophical groundwork but that doesn't make it "important" in the way you are suggesting. It's a matter of being able to think in terms of millennia, not just decades or the odd century. It's reasonable to expect most current scientific ideas to turn into quaint and extremely limited when seen from radical different perspectives, not unlike any earlier theological theories. And yet they still might carry or develop sound philosophical and scientific notions!
We could compare Feynman to Aquinas by saying that both were groundbreaking thinkers in their areas. To compare a physical theory to a philosophical one doesn't make much sense.

So we have that nothing inherently exists because a thing necessarily depends on other things for its existence. But something that is necessary is something that has inherent existence.
It depends not on any specific nature -- inherent, intrinsic, essential -- to become or remain what it is. The existence of causality denies any real self-nature because of its unlimited change and relativity. Perhaps you are interpreting the idea of necessity as something specific instead of logical?
David said: They are both trapped in the realm of uncertainty - science because of its provisional nature, and religion because of its reliance on blind faith. . I would question whether the statement "nothing inherently exists" implies that everything is provisional. It is a statement about everything in existence, if it is a provisional statement it is not a logical truth, as a logical truth it cannot be provisional. I like to think that Feynman and Aquinas understood what logic is about.
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Diebert van Rhijn
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Re: Hello genius forum

Post by Diebert van Rhijn »

Bobo wrote:The enlightenment (and other artistic and scientific revolutions or reforms, like the renaissance too) had as its motor changes in the economy and power of the time and place where it happened, that means it was moved by business and money. Art and science are not economical activities per se (and neither artists or scientist are businessman themselves) but they can be captured by and exist in relation to other powers that form the cultural (timely) relations. Now a 'Reason', for example, that is presupposed timeless will either fall with the times or have to turn against the powers from where it sprung up. That can happen with universalistic values where it fails to come to fruition it may show signs of its own decay.
I'm not sure if I understand this analysis. It seems to be one possible social-historical theory but isn't that beyond the scope of the topic? As for "timeless Reason", I'm not sure if I understand what you are thinking about here. Do you mean timeless and absolute truths? All expressions will come to fruition, fall, and turn. Even reasonable expressions pointing to absolute truths about this existence. Obviously one cannot "capture" anything in words but that holds true for all experiences, if you think about it. And in that sense they are absolute, the fact and truth of experiencing are one and the same.
That's because you engage here in a thoroughly aesthetic and appearance based thinking which could be called, loosely, feminine.
That depends on what you mean. You could be saying something as stupid as women are beautiful, men are ugly, so aesthetics is a feminine thing. Do you think aesthetics or thought has a gender? Maybe you're anthropomorphizing and then using it normatively.
All higher reasoning derived from appearances, feeling and aesthetics ends up being self-contradicting, superficial and rather meaningless -- not false per se, just ambiguous at best. It's useful to call this feminine simply because it appears in the practical mental world as something weak, deceptive, seductive, passive and therefore employed by all those who are culturally the most in need for power and living under the most stress -- causing the least amount of room to think. If there's a better term, I'd gladly adopt it! Perhaps "materialist" or "egotist" come closer? Or "priest", "slave" or "pharisee"? But nothing upsets and irritates more than using "feminine" -- with more effective associative power -- and most other words seem to have lost that.
We could compare Feynman to Aquinas by saying that both were groundbreaking thinkers in their areas. To compare a physical theory to a philosophical one doesn't make much sense.
But you must realize science or logic was not separated from philosophy and religion in older times. And they're still not, especially when it comes to any interpretation of the quantum realm. Parts of QED have already been abandoned and the cosmological argumentation of Feynman derived from QED is often under question -- but I don't think David was questioning the validity of any math. By the way, David is having an imaginary conversation with, about or around Feynman in An Analysis of the Wisdom of Richard Feyman, somewhere on that page. Just found it and I didn't read it before! One quote: "Physicists could spend eternity conjuring up the most exotic and sublime formulations, and yet for all this they would not come one whit closer to the ultimate. The same applies to all theology, for the very same reasons. It all comes down to trying to stuff the infinite into the finite - it just cannot be done."
It is a statement about everything in existence, if it is a provisional statement it is not a logical truth, as a logical truth it cannot be provisional.
There's a difference between asserting any higher order "truth" and any expression or axiom describing it. Logical systems always imply higher order truths and derive axioms and formulations. But ultimately, like with the Tao, one cannot capture "ultimate truth about existence" and yet every capture necessarily has to express it nevertheless. Logic dictates that simply because that's all it does essentially when all is said and done. Still left are issues of quality, intent, genius, character -- the whole striving.
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Re: Hello genius forum

Post by Bobo »

Diebert van Rhijn wrote: I'm not sure if I understand this analysis. It seems to be one possible social-historical theory but isn't that beyond the scope of the topic? As for "timeless Reason", I'm not sure if I understand what you are thinking about here. Do you mean timeless and absolute truths? All expressions will come to fruition, fall, and turn. Even reasonable expressions pointing to absolute truths about this existence. Obviously one cannot "capture" anything in words but that holds true for all experiences, if you think about it. And in that sense they are absolute, the fact and truth of experiencing are one and the same.
I don't think it is off topic, I will come to genius later. Thinking, like art and science, is actualized in relation to powers in existence. The power of thought lies in part in its capacity to be universal (and explain existence). Historically the universality of thought and reason has reached a new point of actualization at the same time with enlightenment and humanism as the world (the earth) and mankind is realized as a whole in a sphere, and thinking can be universalized. 'Reason' gains a momentum on it and one of the after effects of it is to have two camps on the universality, of "we reached there" (we are enlightened, and have the timeless model) and "not there yet", which may be two common camps in every historical society, the novelty in it was in the new view of the world. Nietzsche may come in to the question of thought and its relation to the will to power.
All higher reasoning derived from appearances, feeling and aesthetics ends up being self-contradicting, superficial and rather meaningless -- not false per se, just ambiguous at best. It's useful to call this feminine simply because it appears in the practical mental world as something weak, deceptive, seductive, passive and therefore employed by all those who are culturally the most in need for power and living under the most stress -- causing the least amount of room to think. If there's a better term, I'd gladly adopt it! Perhaps "materialist" or "egotist" come closer? Or "priest", "slave" or "pharisee"? But nothing upsets and irritates more than using "feminine" -- with more effective associative power -- and most other words seem to have lost that.
Part of aesthetics lies in valuing quality over quantity. So which is masculine and which is feminine? Quality or quantity? It's useful to call this feminine because of quantity or quality? Since we are on it I may ask the same thing of usefulness is it masculine or feminine? Maybe usefulness is on the mean, or does it must be either he or she.
But you must realize science or logic was not separated from philosophy and religion in older times. And they're still not, especially when it comes to any interpretation of the quantum realm. Parts of QED have already been abandoned and the cosmological argumentation of Feynman derived from QED is often under question -- but I don't think David was questioning the validity of any math. By the way, David is having an imaginary conversation with, about or around Feynman in An Analysis of the Wisdom of Richard Feyman, somewhere on that page. Just found it and I didn't read it before! One quote: "Physicists could spend eternity conjuring up the most exotic and sublime formulations, and yet for all this they would not come one whit closer to the ultimate. The same applies to all theology, for the very same reasons. It all comes down to trying to stuff the infinite into the finite - it just cannot be done."
David was questioning Feynman's endeavors in science (only). "I'm not convinced that Feynman was aware of what a fundamental issue was. He wouldn't have stayed within the limited confines of science if he had been". I think David is categorizing human behavior in a few camps and attributing genius only to what he does. To bring Weininger again in discussion I think he wrote about that before and categorized scientists, artists and religious people, and those divided in practical and theorical, to have practical and theoretical scientists, artists, and theoretical religion of the theologist and sistematic philosopher and the practical unsistematic religion of the mystic. To David the genius has direct experience and makes no theories about reality.
The word genius in Rome is said to be first used as "the guardian spirit of a place". The spirit of a place, spaciousness, is what is lacking in David's definition of genius. Genius may be timeless in potential but the actuality of it happens in space, that one can be in the same place of a genius and the fact that others were and were not genius (while they may be in potential) is what gives something genius. To make the infinite finite even if it is impossible.
What makes the Renaissance remarkable is the convergence of science, art, and religion, which may be conducing to genius.

-
I used Google ngram viewer it seems that before the 18th century the word genius was used more like the genius of a population or the genius to do something, not really applied to individuals. There's a rise in the word in the middle of that century which coincides with the industrial revolution, the books from that time seems to praise the inventiveness of genius. I compared genius with other words like inspiration, talent and disposition. The results for disposition are the closest to the results for genius.

https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?c ... on%3B%2Cc0
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Diebert van Rhijn
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Re: Larking Debate

Post by Diebert van Rhijn »

Bobo wrote:Part of aesthetics lies in valuing quality over quantity. So which is masculine and which is feminine? Quality or quantity? It's useful to call this feminine because of quantity or quality? Since we are on it I may ask the same thing of usefulness is it masculine or feminine? Maybe usefulness is on the mean, or does it must be either he or she.
At some point the usefulness of dividing things in just two categories becomes severely limited. Fluids feminine? Solids masculine? If a division needs to be made using them as philosophical categories, it's best to use them only in situations where both never meet, as if they function in completely different universes. There's no "balance" or "struggle" as for that there's needs to be a shared or mutual element. Black holes and "punctuality" cannot be balanced either but that doesn't mean the first should not be avoided and the latter could not be valued in the right circumstance.
The word genius in Rome is said to be first used as "the guardian spirit of a place". The spirit of a place, spaciousness, is what is lacking in David's definition of genius.
It's about the essential, which even the "guardian spirit" refers to. The elemental "vibe" or quality of a place as many paranormal investigators would attest to. What I like about this close tie between spirit and context is the obvious truth in it: the spiritual or emanation always is caused by some locality -– brought forth by it. One speaks only in essences after all, trying to capture and convey experiences, that is: the quality of consciousness.

As far as I"m concerned genius maps back even to classical demonic and Luciferian principles.
  • “And I say too, that every wise man who happens to be a good man is more than human (daimonion) both in life and death, and is rightly called a demon.” – Socrates in Plato’s Cratylus
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Re: Larkin Debate (was: Hello genius forum)

Post by Glostik91 »

Hey Matt,

One of the great things about philosophical stimulation is that you don't need to know anyone who is interested in philosophy to actually be stimulated by philosophy. Have a look at one of the many free books on the internet. Read some Hume or Kant. There are many ideas just waiting to be bitten and chewed like a thick steak on a Sunday afternoon. What's even better is that you can go at your own pace. You don't have to feel as if you need to respond to Hume or Kant, therefore there is no need to feel overwhelmed. Just read a few pages at a time. Even a few sentences every day would probably do the trick. Just my advice and 2cents.
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